The Xperia sola also features “floating touch” navigation, which enables “magic” web browsing without physically touching the screen. “Xperia sola comes with the power of Sony and a sense of magic with floating touch, giving consumers a fun new way to browse the web and latest technology to show off,” said Calum MacDougall, Sony’s Head of Xperia marketing.

The device also comes with two NFC Xperia SmartTags in the box, which owners can use to launch a pre-configured profile on their smartphone. The two SmartTags included with the handset can be personalized with up to 10 commands. The Xperia sola will be available worldwide in black, white and red in the second quarter of 2012.

If you’re not familiar with CyanogenMod 9 it’s based off of Google’s latest Andoid ‘ICe Cream Sandwich’ 4.0 and is expected to make its way to a whole slew of devices as time goes on. Unfortunately, seeing how this is an unofficial alpha build you’re going to have to expect some problems. On that note, proceed at your own risk.

In addition to the front facing camera, the AT&T logo is nowhere to be seen, which makes us believe that we’re looking at an international version of the phone as well. The photographs are still available on the Facebook photo album even though the wall posts have been removed, so we’re not sure what to think. Perhaps an announcement at MWC 2012? Stay tuned.

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If for some reason you or someone in your life needs a Galaxy S II that really stands out from the pack, you’re in luck. It seems that a pink version of the Galaxy S II will be hitting the UK just in time for Valentine’s Day. Unfortunately, there’s no word on when the pink device will be making its way to the United States but, as always, we’ll keep you posted.

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Running on a version of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, the Lenovo K800 seems to be headed for the Chinese market originally, as it touted an all Chinese menu until someone changed it to English, giving us hope that it might also see the light of day in Europe, North America and the rest of the world. Similar to the Intel reference model that was being demostrated at CES, the Lenovo K800 will run on an 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z2460 processor with 512KB of L2 cache and 512MB RAM, accompanied by a PowerVR SGX 540 GPU clocked at around 400MHz, dual-channel LPDDR2 memory and a 1,900mAH battery. Rewind the clock by a few years, and this is truly an engineering miracle. Other hardware specifications include a 4.5″ at 1280×720 (720p HD) resolution and an 8-megapixel camera at the back.

The 8-megapixel camera on the back also promises to deliver superb quality pictures and 720p video footage. The Lenovo S2 runs on a 1.4GHz single-core Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8255 platform and is expected to arrive in two versions: one with 512MB of RAM and 8 gigs of internal storage, and another one with a gig of RAM and 16GB of storage.

On the software side, the skin you see allows you to pin app shortcuts to the homescreen and it will also sync your photos to the cloud, but at its core the experience remains Gingerbread-flavored. What interests us more is whether and when the device will get updated to Ice Cream Sandwich and Lenovo hasn’t said anything about that.

The Lenovo S2 will go on sale in China immediately, but we’re yet to heard a definite release date and pricing for other markets.

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The launch came and went however, and instead of the Bliss, we got the HTC Rhyme — a ‘lifestyle’ phone with a plethora of accessories, all of which you can see in this video review with Amie Parker-Williams.

There’s nothing to say the Rhyme is explicitly just for ladies, but a less than subtle advertising campaign in women’s magazines which pairs the plum-coloured device with similarly hued fashion accessories has led us to suspect that this purple blower, complete with glowing charm, might well be aimed at the female demographic. Quite the detectives, aren’t we?

Take a look at our video review though and you’ll see that the Rhyme isn’t to be sniffed at. It’s classy rather than garishly girly, and while the charm is a little patronising and the earphones are naff, the docking station that’s included is a thoughtful addition that wouldn’t go amiss if it were to be bundled with future HTC phones.

As the HTC Rhyme Review says, the device boasts a 3.7-inch screen, which is modest compared to HTC’s other recent efforts, such as the 4.7-inch displays on the Titan and Sensation XL. HTC’s attractive Sense 3.5 interface, one of our favourite manufacturer-made skins, sits on top of Android Gingerbread 2.3, and makes for a top-notch home screen and scrolling experience.

Overall, this mid-range Android phone has much to recommend it, but we can see neither reason nor rhyme why HTC would feel the need to create a phone specifically for women. Quite frankly, the ladies we know would demand better specs than can be found on the Rhyme — better headphones too, especially considering the partnership between HTC and Beats by Dr Dre.

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As a smartphone the HTC Vivid employs the same rectangular, black slab design of most current handsets, and is about average in dimensions for all 4G phones, measuring 5.07 x 2.64 x 0.44 inches (129 x 67 x 11 mm). As its is written in the HTC Vivid Review the average weight for a 4G smartphone these days is 4.3 ounces, and in this regard the HTC Vivid is slightly heavier, at 6.24 ounces. The 4.50 inch display mentioned earlier is an S–LCD screen which delivers 540 x 960 pixel resolution with built-in light and proximity sensors. Navigation is delivered through capacitive multitouch gestures.

Average talk time on a single battery charge is 4.60 hours, with a standby time of 12 1/2 days. The HTC Vivid contains a dual core 1.2 GHz QUALCOMM APQ8060 processor, and that is supported by 1.0 GB of RAM memory. 16 GB of onboard storage come built into the handset, and that can be ramped up to 32 GB via the on board microSD slot. A rear facing 8.0 megapixel camera offers autofocus and dual LED flash features, and shoots video in 1920 x 1080 pixels (1080p HD) at 30 frames per second. The accompanying 1.3 megapixel front facing chat cam which also offers video call capability can record video in 1280 x 720 pixels (720p HD) at 60 frames per second.

Buy the HTC Vivid 4G phone starting at only $159.99.

The above-mentioned YouTube video application is on board, and accompanying video and audio players support all major file formats. That on board music player can filter by artist, play list or album, and an FM stereo is also installed. Video out is possible through HDMI access, and wireless connectivity options are offered through Bluetooth version 3.0 and Wi-Fi 802.11 b, g, n. The HTC Vivid 4G Android handset is available exclusively on the AT&T 4G wireless broadband network at a retail price starting at only $159 at select AT&T authorized retailers with a two-year activation.

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Now, Pocketnow.com has published the first image of the smartphone, which appears to resemble a thinner HTC Sensation. The HTC Ville is expected to feature an 8-millimeter thick case containing a 4.3-inch qHD Super AMOLED display, a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon processor, an 8-megapixel camera, HSPA+, a 1,650 mAh battery and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich with the HTC Sense 4.0 UI.

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